The Code
by Grac3
Summary: Sherlock receives an email with a hidden message, one that will only be revealed when he has cracked a code set by the email's sender. "The code will remain until it is solved. Don't waste time considering this. I know you won't be able to resist."


**Disclaimer: I don't own Sherlock.**

**Warning: Reference to smoking.**

**A.N.:** I am fairly new to this fandom (and I've actually only seen the first series), so this is my first ever Sherlock fic. Because of this, I would like to apologise in advance for my truly awful attempts at deductions.

* * *

Bored. No cases. No experiments – John had banned him for a week after a miscalculated attempt to find out the effect of a hairdryer on a top of the range smartphone (which had just happened to belong to the doctor) ended in a pile of smoking hardware parts on the coffee table, eventually setting off the fire alarm and waking everyone in the building up at what John had claimed to be 'an ungodly hour'.

_Honestly,_ Sherlock had scoffed to himself. _It had only been five in the morning. The sun was even coming up._

He lay on the sofa staring at the ceiling, his arms lying limp at his sides. The overwhelming silence pressed on him from all sides, only cut through by the sounds of his flatmate conversing with Mrs Hudson on the stairs.

"Still bored?" the landlady was saying in a concerned voice.

"Probably," John sighed.

"Oh, dear. Still, at least he isn't shooting the wall."

Sherlock felt a smile pull at the corners of his mouth. No, he wasn't shooting the wall. Although that may have had something to do with the doctor hiding his gun.

The two finished their conversation, and Sherlock found himself counting the seconds until the door opened and John let himself in.

"Still bored?" John asked as he walked passed him and went into the kitchen.

He grunted in reply. His boredom propelled his memory back to two weeks previously, when John had disappeared without warning. He had been in his room, and then he had left. He hadn't had a therapist's appointment that day, so it wasn't that. He had not bothered to change his clothes, so it probably hadn't been a job interview or anything formal. It hadn't been lunchtime, so he was probably not going to meet a friend or family member for a meal. Besides, he hadn't been gone long enough for that. Yet he had returned with a bottle of milk, so maybe he had just gone out for that.

It might not even have been worth the detective's time.

He was brought sharply back to reality when his phone bleeped. It was not the usual bleep that his phone made: the one that signalled a text message arriving. He plucked the phone from the arm of the sofa behind his head and his fingers flicked across the keys.

It was an email.

He didn't recognise the address.

_Dear Mr Sherlock Holmes,_

_I would like to offer my congratulations on your impressive deduction skills; they leave me green with envy._

_However, I admit I find myself thoroughly unconvinced that a single individual can possess quite such a remarkable brain. In my opinion, you no doubt had help at every stage of your investigations._

_Nevertheless, I would like to offer you a chance to prove me wrong. I have a message for you, hidden at the end of this email. To receive the message, you only have to gain the two-part password by cracking a code that I myself have devised_ without assistance_._ _I may watch you to make sure you play by my rules. Here is your first clue:_

Underneath, there was a picture of a word written on a piece of paper: TINTAGEL_._ Every letter was a different colour and a different font, except for the two 't's: they were in the same font, so that they looked like crosses. The 'a' also numbers in it, so that it looked like a clock face.

_Good luck._

_P.S. The code will remain until it is cracked. Don't waste time considering this. I know you won't be able to resist._

Underneath the postscript was a video; there was a curser flashing on the black rectangle, ready for the password to be entered.

Sherlock sat bolt upright, his slim phone held between his thin fingers. The thrill of a puzzle, a game, was fizzling in his veins like electricity, pushing the boredom out of the way and taking its place.

Yet a niggling gripped at him. Who was this mysterious sender?

It could be a trap.

It could be Moriarty.

He sneered at the message, pressing the 'back' button on his phone until the email disappeared and dropping the device on his stomach as he flopped back on the sofa.

The boredom began to creep in once more.

_The code will remain until it is cracked._

Somewhere in the kitchen, John had turned the kettle on. The sound of the water boiling was magnified by his tedium, until it sounded like thunder roaring in his ears.

_I know you won't be able to resist._

Indeed, the picture clue was already burned onto his memory like a brand, and his challenge-starved brain had begun piecing the parts of the hint together. He was sure he had the location of the second piece of the puzzle.

He found it could not be ignored.

Sighing, he snatched his phone back up and leapt off the sofa, grabbing his coat and flinging it over his shoulders. He left his scarf behind, for the sun was beating hard and hot down on the crowded streets of London in what was probably going to be the only day of summer that the city ever had this year.

He bid John a rushed goodbye, not waiting to hear the doctor's response before thundering down the stairs and exiting into Baker Street.

~{G}~

He walked casually down the road, not wanting to draw attention to himself. He turned into a residential street, passing its sign: Tintagel Terrace. His inner GPS of London told him that there were two churches on Tintagel Terrace – which he had deduced were represented by the two crosses in the picture clue. He passed the first without so much as a glance; the email sender had mentioned being 'green with envy', and the second of the crosses had been green, indicating that whatever it was that he was looking for, it was in the second church.

St Peter's Church was a large and impressive building, older than the first church had been. It was obvious that it had been the first building built in this area, and that the residential streets it now sat in the middle of were constructed later. The large metal doors were flung wide open, inviting anyone and everyone in, even though it was a bleak Monday morning and not many frequented religious institutions on such mornings as this. It was far more likely that the church was open for matters other than services, and indeed when he stepped inside there were several people with dusters cleaning the pews and placing lost objects in a box near the back of the building.

None of the people paid attention to him, for although the church had been opened for cleaning he was not the only one who had entered for personal reasons. A man was sitting in the front of the church looking wistfully up at the stained glass window behind the alter.

_Probably asking God for help because his wife is having an affair and he's about to lose his job because he drinks too much,_ Sherlock mused, deleting the information as soon as it entered his mind.

The cleaners had not dusted all of the pews, so the object he was looking for was either in one of the yet-to-be-attended-to pews, or in the lost property box at the back of the church. He hoped it was the former; he did not wish to engage in any form of social interaction that might arise from him looking through the box.

He began checking the pews for the object alluded to in the email. The sender would be 'watching him', and the 'a' of Tintagel had been turned into a clock face; he was obviously searching for a timepiece of some sort, probably a watch.

It was in the third pew on the right from the back of church that Sherlock saw a glint of gold from under the seat. He snatched it up, sitting down to inspect the watch. It looked expensive – a Rolex – yet it was far too light to be real gold and the logo was not quite right, meaning that it could only be a fake.

He turned to his left, ready to tell John his deductions that would lead him to the next clue and – hopefully – to the first part of the password. Yet the doctor was not there. He had come out alone.

Scowling at his need to think out loud, he scoured the church for someone he could talk to, for everyone he could reasonably waffle on at in his usual manner was at 221b Baker Street. He was in no mood to engage any of the other humans in the church and he was certainly not going to talk to himself: he may have been a sociopath but he was _not_ crazy.

His search became more frantic, pale blue eyes scouring everything in sight, until he saw it: an image of Christ (_oil painting, late 16__th__ Century_) on the wall of the south side of the church. Taking the watch with him, he practically leapt over to the oil painting and began to explain to the image all that he had learned about its owner, and where to find the next clue.

"There is condensation on the watch face," he explained, angling the plastic towards the painting so that it could 'see' the little droplets of water on the transparent pane, "and the fake gold has been corroded slightly," he pointed at the damaged 'gold' either side of the watch face, which had been eroded so that it was showing the boring copper underneath. "This suggests steam damage. The quality of the gold is also an indicator that this is a fake Rolex.

"You would only wear such an obvious fake for two reasons: either you had bought it yourself, lacking the sufficient funding to get a real one yet nevertheless wanted one so as to show off your love for designer labels; or it was a gift and you were going to see the person who had given it to you. In this case, it is obviously the former; a simple inspection of the pew in which the watch was left proves that he was alone and therefore they were not seeing someone who could have bought them this watch. Hence, they bought it themselves."

He rearranged the watch in his fingers so that the watch strap was held between his long digits, while the face and the rest of the strap were dangling out of his grip.

"There is a yoghurt stain on the strap," he explained, holding the watch in one hand to point at the small blob of white product on the fake gold. "Fresh," he touched it and it was still wet, "but not cleaned off. This, along with the condensation still on the watch face suggests that the owner does not bother to clean this kind of mess off because it would only happen again and again, which means that this happened while he was at work. Steam and yoghurt mean a restaurant, probably a chef or a waiter, someone who would spend a significant amount of time in the kitchen but not necessarily all of the time. Furthermore, the thickness of the yoghurt suggests a Greek restaurant; quite an up-market one, nonetheless, for the quality is higher than most restaurants.

"And lastly, the watch was left here on Sunday evening because churches are checked by the… um…" Sherlock paused, struggling to remember the name of the position held by such church volunteers. He was sure he had known once – much like he was sure that he had once known that the earth goes round the sun – yet he couldn't seem to remember. "Um… sidespeople!" he exclaimed, causing one of the cleaners who had reached the back pews to jump at the sudden noise and shoot the detective a reproachful look. Sherlock ignored them. "Yes, the sidespeople check the pews after Sunday morning services but not after Sunday evening services. So it had been left in the evening otherwise it would already have either been returned to the owner or put in the lost property box." He pointed at the lost property box in case the painting either had no recollection of or simply had no knowledge of just what a lost property box was.

"Who goes to an evening service but not a morning service?" he continued, despite the fact that three cleaners were now congregated by the last pew and were whispering to each other and pointing at him. "People who can't make it to a morning service. Why couldn't he come to the morning service? Because he was at work, collecting condensation and yoghurt stains on his watch." He was vaguely aware that his voice was becoming louder.

"Therefore, the owner of this watch is a brand-conscious chef or waiter at an up-market Greek restaurant that opens on Sundays!" he concluded triumphantly, looking back down at the watch and suddenly noticing that he had missed something – something crucial. "Oh, and there is ash residue on the strap, so he smokes as well."

He looked back up at the painting, indifferent to what it had just been told. They had an odd kind of staring contest for a few moments.

"Thank you," Sherlock nodded at the painting, before rushing out of the church – passed the gossiping cleaners, one of whom was now giggling mockingly – and off to the only nearby up-market Greek restaurant that was open on Sundays.

~{G}~

The alley behind Marinos' was dark and dingy. There was a large office block behind it, casting a large shadow so that it was bathed in darkness even at midday. Sherlock had waited until lunchtime to wait for the watch's owner, for if there was any environment that would force the man out for a cigarette, it was the stress of a restaurant full of customers having their lunch.

He waited on the opposite side of the alley to the back door of the restaurant, slightly hidden in shadows. He didn't dare touch anything, for fear of having some kind of muck from the filthy alley smeared all over his beloved coat. He gave the large dustbin overflowing with unfinished meals a disapproving look and pulled the dark blue material closer to himself.

His concentration fully on the door before him, he nearly jumped when something brushed up against his leg. Scowling at his being caught off-guard, he looked down to see a small black cat winding its way between his feet. Seemingly aware that it had been noticed, it looked up at him with pitiful and large green eyes, and proceeded to meow incredibly loudly at him.

"Go away!" he told it, trying to step out from underneath it. It followed him, somehow becoming even louder. "I don't have anything for you!" The cat, however, seemed to not believe him, and its mewling became sadder as though trying to guilt him into providing it with whatever it wanted; food, presumably. Deciding that it was not worth using excess energy trying to look cute in order to achieve its ends, the cat merely sat back and yelled at him.

Sherlock groaned, pinching the bridge of his nose. "Please shut up," he begged the cat. It didn't.

When that failed, he decided to give the animal his most intimidating glare, one that made some criminals confess out of sheer fear. The cat responded to this, stopping meowing for a few seconds to cock its head to one side, watching him as if he were a mildly interesting piece of film. Then it started shouting again.

Luckily, the back door of the restaurant opened, and a man wearing black trousers, a white shirt, an apron and a hideously fake tan stepped out. The cat scarpered at the noise while the man reached into his pocket for a cigarette and began to light up.

He was holding his left hand a little oddly, as though he was used to having extra weight on it. There was also a logo of a man playing polo sticking out of the top of his apron, yet the quality of the material suggested that his shirt was not a true Ralph Lauren. Conclusion: man who had lost a watch and wears fake designer clothes.

Sherlock stepped out of the shadows, producing the watch from his pocket. The man jumped at the sight of someone seemingly appearing out of thin air before him, and his lighter fell to the floor with a dull _click_. He stooped to pick it up as the detective approached him.

"What the-" he began, but was interrupted.

"I believe this is your watch?" Sherlock asked him, holding the fake Rolex out to him.

The man regarded the watch with a disbelieving expression before looking at Sherlock, his eyes growing wide. "Flipping heck," he breathed. "He said… You're Sherlock Holmes?"

"Yes," Sherlock nodded, slightly annoyed that the man had not yet taken his watch; he was not going to wait all day. "Who said what?"

"Well," the man began, stammering slightly as he took his watch back with a nod of thanks. "A guy came up to me last night in church and asked me to leave my watch behind. He said a man named Sherlock Holmes would find it for me the next day, and that when he gave it back, that I was to give you this." He reached into his pocket and produced a folded-up piece of paper. "But how did you know it was my watch?" the guy asked, slightly awestruck.

"Simple deductions," Sherlock explained impatiently, taking the piece of paper from the man and opening it up. It said: 'Password Part 1:' and had a smiley face on it. Nothing else.

"Did the man say who he was?" the detective asked, looking up from the paper.

The man shook his head.

"What did he look like?" he demanded, becoming more and more exasperated.

The man looked rather frightened now. "H-he told me not to tell you."

Sherlock sighed. If it had been Moriarty, he would have wanted Sherlock to know that it was him. Yet the mysterious email sender was keeping their identity strangely hidden.

"B-but he did say something else," the man told him, as though not wanting to leave Sherlock angry with him.

"Yes?"

"He said that the next part of the password was on the menu."

"The menu?" Sherlock asked. "Of Marinos'?"

The man nodded. Sherlock ran off down the alley to the front of the restaurant, leaving the man, confused, to finish his cigarette.

The alley opened out next to the entrance to the restaurant; he made a sharp right and found himself standing before a barrier that snaked around to create a queue during busy times and ended where the restaurant began. At the start of the barrier was a large display case with the menu in it. Sherlock stood in front of the menu, staring at it intently. He could see nothing remarkable about the menu, other than that everything was disastrously overpriced. He could feel his frustration growing, just as it had as he searched the Veneer for the proof that it was a fake.

On the menu…

On the menu…

The font looked oddly familiar. A swirling, joined-up font that was incredibly posh.

"_That's a rather feminine font, John."_

_John jumped in his chair, nearly dropping his laptop off of his lap as he whirled around to glare at his flatmate, who was leaning on the back of the chair and looking over the doctor's shoulder._

"_I told you not to sneak up on me," he said plainly, turning back to his laptop. "Besides, what do you mean, 'feminine font'?"_

_Sherlock indicated the title of his blog. "The swirling, joined-up nature of this typeface are incredibly ladylike. Was that not the effect you were hoping for? What's it called?"_

_John was scowling. "'Happy birthday'," he explained in a disgruntled grumble, saving his unfinished post and going to the settings menu to change it._

Marinos' used the same font on their menu; 'Happy birthday'.

Sherlock opened the piece of paper the watch owner had given him again. A smiley face. Happy.

"Happy birthday?" he sneered. "The password is 'happy birthday'?"

He stuffed the piece of paper back into his pocket, thoroughly unsatisfied with this outcome. He marched angrily back through London. The sender of the email had to explain themselves.

~{G}~

When he returned to the flat, John had already left for his later shift at the surgery. The doctor's laptop was lying unattended on the coffee table, lid closed and powered down. Sherlock headed straight for it, for his phone had begun making an annoying bleeping sound that signalled its need to be charged; something which the detective would happily do, if his charger were not currently holding together two slats on his bed which had been broken during an experiment with hammers.

Flicking the laptop open, he waited impatiently for the machine to turn itself on; the software loaded agonisingly slowly, and his mind was twitching in agitation to see the message revealed – for completion.

The antagonism grew to almost unbearable limits as the laptop finally powered up; he typed loudly on the keys to open the internet, almost smashing them with the force.

"Come on!" he barked at the machine, in awe of those who could manage to put up with such sluggish behaviour on the part of technology on a regular basis.

The email was still there when he – finally – logged on, and he scrolled down to the video where the cursor was still blinking at him, almost mockingly.

He smirked as he entered the pathetic password, but it slipped off his face when the first frame of the video appeared.

The video had been filmed in what was unmistakeably the only room in 221b that Sherlock had never entered: John's bedroom. Indeed, the doctor's face was beaming from the screen at him.

"John, what the hell…" he breathed, raising his hands from the keyboard slowly as though spikes were going to appear from the gaps between the keys and pierce him.

"Hey, Sherlock," John smiled. "Uh… I suppose I'd better explain myself."

Sherlock nodded dumbly at the screen.

"A couple of weeks ago, I got kidnapped by your brother again. He told me that your birthday was coming up and that you'd probably forgotten about it. But I wanted to get you something anyway.

"But you-" he raised an accusatory finger up at Sherlock. "You are impossible to buy for! You don't need anything, you don't want anything-"

"I need uranium for my experiment-" Sherlock began.

"And I am _not_ getting you uranium!" He sighed. "So, I thought this was better. Create a trail across London, hopefully slightly intriguing, and… well…" He shrugged pathetically. "I hope you enjoyed it. Happy birthday." He reached for something out of shot and pulled out a party popper, letting it go and covering himself with the stupid sugar paper strips that those infernal things were filled with.

"Oh," he continued, as though this was an afterthought, "and I've got Mycroft's gift for you under my bed. I had to hide it in a bag with milk to make sure you didn't get suspicious and want to see it early. I give you permission to enter my room and get it. But don't look through my stuff!"

He smiled once more, and the video finished.

Sherlock closed the lid of the laptop. A birthday message? Mycroft was right: he _had_ forgotten. He'd been too busy focusing on his own boredom and lethargy to remember. Not that he generally bothered to remember his own birthday: it was one of those non-important things that he could easily delete.

Nevertheless, he felt rather… touched that John would go to all this effort for an occasion such as this.

But what would Mycroft have gotten him?

He pushed himself up off of the floor next to the coffee table and walked to John's room. It seemed wrong to be entering the doctor's space. He had to remind himself that he had one-time permission to do so, but it still felt… wrong.

He pushed open the door and a small smile touched his lips. Everything inside was neat and ordered, the soldier in the man reflected by his arrangement.

_But don't look through my stuff!_

His fingers were twitching at his side, begging him to disobey. But he couldn't. Not to John. Never to John.

He crossed the room swiftly, dropping to his hands and knees to look under the bed. A single box was sitting there, neatly wrapped in fancy paper with a large tag hanging off the side. He reached got it and unwrapped it, exposing the box inside with one transparent face, clearly showing the object inside.

It was a tie.

~{G}~

When John returned from his shift that evening, Sherlock was lying on the sofa, his fingers linked over his stomach and the ridiculously expensive tie around his throat.

"Hey," the doctor greeted him, before stopping in his tracks. He had noticed. "I see you got my message." Sherlock could hear the amusement in his voice.

"I did," the detective nodded. He couldn't stop a small smile from forming. "Thank you."

"You're welcome."

The doctor sat in his chair and flicked the television on.

Sherlock lay on the sofa, staring at the ceiling, the piece of paper with a smiley face on it still in his pocket.


End file.
